Zep’s main writers reformed on 17 Apr 94, as a part of the Alexis Korner Blues Show at Buxton, England. On 25 & 26 Aug’, they taped performances in London, Wales & Morocco, with Egyptian & Moroccan orchestration of several Zep’ tunes along with four new songs, backed by Farouk el Safi. The performances aired on October 12, and were so successful commercially and artistically that the two coordinated a tour which kicked off in February, 1995. The Unplugged performance was released as an album in November, 1994 as No Quarter: Jimmy Page and Robert Plant Unledded. It’s rumored that John Paul Jones was excluded due to a feud between him and Plant, dating from the mid-80’s. Their tour took them across the world with a lineup including Charlie Jones playing bass and percussion, Michael Lee on drums, Porl Thompson performing guitar and banjo, Najma Akhtar providing backup vocals, Jim Sutherland on mandolin and bodhrán, Nigel Eaton hurdy gurdy, and Ed Shearmur playing Hammond organ with orchestral arrangements. Afterwards, they entered the studio with legendary engineer Steve Albini to record Walking into Clarksdale, an album of entirely new material. This album was not as commercially successful as Unledded had been, and the Page/Plant reunion slowly dissolved, with both members going on to perform with other side projects. |
